


Undefeated

by Evalangui



Category: Original Work
Genre: Disabled Character of Color, F/F, LGBTQ Character of Color, LGBTQ Female Character of Color, Original Female Character(s) - Freeform, Teen Romance, amputee character, young adult
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-12-19
Updated: 2017-12-19
Packaged: 2019-02-17 05:58:56
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 15,421
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13070580
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Evalangui/pseuds/Evalangui
Summary: So I wrote and published ages ago, it's YA and a lot sweeter than my usual fare. I contain multitudes? :p Also I named the main characters Shla and Seda, which start and end with the same letter AND have the same number of letters. To make matters slightly better, it's told in first POV so it's not so obvious.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> So I wrote and published ages ago, it's YA and a lot sweeter than my usual fare. I contain multitudes? :p Also I named the main characters Shla and Seda, which start and end with the same letter AND have the same number of letters. To make matters slightly better, it's told in first POV so it's not so obvious.

 

 

 

 

 

_Out of the night that covers me,_

_Black as the pit from pole to pole,_

_I thank whatever gods may be_

_For my unconquerable soul._

_In the fell clutch of circumstance_

_I have not winced nor cried aloud._

_Under the bludgeonings of chance_

_My head is bloody, but unbowed._

_Beyond this place of wrath and tears_

_Looms but the Horror of the shade,_

_And yet the menace of the years_

_Finds and shall find me unafraid._

_It matters not how strait the gate,_

_How charged with punishments the scroll,_

_I am the master of my fate,_

_I am the captain of my soul._

**_Invictus, by William Ernest Henley._ **

****  
  


I'm not gonna lie to you; before the accident I was barely keeping up with school. It isn't that I'm dumb, because I'm not. I'm average, I guess. It's that I swam an hour and a half every morning and two in the afternoons, more on weekends. Homework got done because my parents didn’t give me a choice about it. That doesn’t mean I remembered much; I’m not the kind of girl who goes to class, then does a little revision and does just fine. I understand just fine, but it doesn’t seem to stay with me.   


Movement? That I can memorize in an instant. Rhythm? No problem. Words, though, aren't my thing. Words slow the world down. I can't handle slow. Since I was a kid, I always ran the fastest, swung the hardest, jumped the highest. And then I found the pool, where I could move in every direction with a smoothness air would never allow of someone with no wings. It was love at first dip, that simple.  


The second time around, when the doctor finally cleared me to go into the pool, was almost better than the first. I just knew it. I didn’t even need to swim; it was enough just feeling the water embracing me back, warm and heavy against me, supporting my weight and enhancing my movements. In the water, I was whole again. On land, I had stopped forgetting my leg wasn’t there, but in the water, my brain just deleted that information. I ended up swimming in circles but who cared? I was home.  


I wouldn’t have been able to take the six months that followed without the pool. Everywhere else, I was irreparably broken but for at least an hour a day, I got to be ok. Well, not ok, but working on my technique was the kind of gruelling work I enjoyed, the type of progress I was used to working for. Coach Mirima took me back, no questions asked, and read up on one legged swimming techniques to help me. She also stopped me from pushing myself so far I drowned, no mean feat when some days it seemed a better plan than getting out of the pool and going back to my crutches. It had been that way from the first; once I was in the water I never wanted to leave. There was less of me, but that didn’t change.

  
******  


I guess somebody is laughing at me now, stuck like this, alive but trapped. No choice but to take it slow or plummet to the ground. Some mornings I think I will take the fall instead. My lower left leg is gone. It's been gone for months, but now I can write the words without breaking the pencil or ripping the page to shreds. It helps I can also walk again. Well, that’s what I have to call it, nobody who's walked on two legs would call what I'm doing walking. This wobbling about that I have achieved after practicing for weeks, and of which I'm told I should be proud... I am happy to be rid of the crutches, that much I can say, having my arms back is such a relief. I feel a little less mangled, a little less lame.  


I was relieved to go to the prosthetist for a fitting and almost euphoric to get the prosthetic in place. But after a week of failing at stupidly easy exercises that a toddler could have done; I finally understood that it wasn’t going to be ‘just fine’ and it definitely wasn’t going to be ‘just the same but with no risk of people stepping on your toes’ like my brother had joked at the hospital. My hands hurt even when they weren’t clutching at the crutches and the parallel bars and I was close to asking somebody for a wheelchair and calling it a day. Oddly, it was the water that made me realise I couldn’t give up: The swimming pool didn’t have a ramp.

 

So I kept at it. Keeping at it’s something I’m good at, even if I have always kept at the things I was already excellent at so I could be extraordinary. But I know how to handle the discomfort that comes from pushing your limits, and, let’s be honest, the inevitable pain of pushing too far. Learning hurts because changing hurts, it’s gotta hurt, changing is breaking something to remake it into something new. And it hurt to try and move my hips the right way, it hurt to raise my stump enough for the prosthetic to support my weight adequately. It hurt even more to feel useless, to feel like my goal was so tiny and small that it shouldn’t have been a goal. It had been mine already, I had learned to walk, long ago, when it was meant to be hard and, if the baby album is to be believed, it actually didn’t take much to get eleven-month me going.

 

And now I had to go through it again and again to retrain my reflexes to fit my new body. It took so much out of me, the concentrated effort that only something that should come naturally can take… I would drop to sleep every night like unconsciousness was a cliff I had missed and I was made of lead. Mostly, the nightmares woke me. I could never remember them, maybe because I didn't remember what had happened, maybe because I was dreaming what I lived every day. It felt that way: a mix of frustration, anger and a paralyzing helplessness.  


Truth is, some things aren't meant to be learned, just absorbed. Babies won't talk if you don't talk to them, but they sure as hell will crawl and walk. Parents like to hurry the process along but, in the end, babies walk because people walk: It's a basic human function that means we can run away when a bigger thing tries to eat us. If we lived in caves, I would be totally dead. Not just because of the lack of disinfectant or surgery: People around me would know I'm not fit for life anymore. They would let me go. I wouldn't need to fake being something I'm not.  


Another plus side of caves would be the lack of tests I'm about to fail and the absence of snotty classmates intent on 'catching me up'. I'm pretty sure nobody would show up early either, what with the lack of clocks. The girl they send from my new school does, five minutes to five she's ringing the bell and I can hear her chatting up my aunt, who I'm sure is offering her biscuits, milk and maybe even a massage. Aunt Marie is a teacher, so she's wild about me going back to school. She spent the last months filling my hospital room with books, then audiobooks, then 'informative' podcasts. Some of them were pretty good, —Bridge to Terabithia made me cry, even — and I still listen to these girls who talk about hockey.  


My new shiny plastic leg is strapped onto my knee and thigh and covered by my trousers so as to be impossible to distinguish from my real one. I check myself out once more in the floor to ceiling mirror I need to do my exercises. My hair is a bit messy, but who cares? Surely not my new 'tutor'. She knocks on my door and I call out to her to come in. She opens the door, but she doesn’t enter. She blinks dark eyes at me from behind her rimless glasses. Her mouth has fallen a little open.

 

I look down, worried something is showing after all, but if it wasn't for the incongruous absence of sensation on my left side, I wouldn't know. I look back up at her, taking a step closer because I kind of want to take a step back, and you can’t let that show. "What?"

 

She tenses, even though I’m not even remotely close enough to, say, hit her. "I... I thought you were white."  


I snort, too relieved to take offense. "I'm adopted. Not my biggest problem at the moment."

 

She smiles at me, looking a little relieved herself. "It just... it seemed a bit too... British, I guess." And it's then that I notice the slight twinge of her accent.  


“I am British. I was born here.” Her own skin is a light chocolate brown, light enough that it’s perfectly visible when she blushes. She looks so adorable that I almost resist, but not quite. “You have anything against Britishness?” I ask, coming to lean against the doorway on my good side, relieving the weight I have to put on the leg.  


“No!” she assures me. “No, it’s…” Her hands flutter nervously in front of her, like she hopes to pluck the words out of the air. “I just worry. Some people are weird about it. About me. Especially with the tutoring.”  


And suddenly, I get it. I step back, indicating that she should take the chair by my desk. Her relieved smile from earlier makes a reappearance as she does. She is not hesitant exactly, but careful, her body controlled, inhibited. I can see her, but I can also see what other people see, what they think. That she isn’t smart enough to be tutoring anybody, a black girl with a foreign accent. I have the right accent but I have gotten a lot of shit for being a different shade than my parents and, let’s be real, simply being the wrong shade. And I got so much shit for being a girl who could outrun any boy in the neighbourhood and out-punch a good many that… Well, that won’t be a problem anymore.   


I turn to my guest. “I hope you know what you are doing.”  


That cheers her up. She straightens, saying, “I do.”

 

We start with Science, because it makes me want to cry a little less than Maths or English. The saddest thing is, once upon a time I thought I would like physics because in practice it makes so much sense to me. I understand the way things will turn out: how far a ball will be thrown, how much I need to move to catch it, what curvature of my fingers will propel me faster through water. But when you write it all down… my sense of what is where is as flat as the paper. Seda listens to me explain all this, not complaining that it doesn’t add anything to the actual learning, frowning intently, eyes lost in the distance but focused on my voice.  


“Well, if you can remember what happens,” she says thoughtfully, “what you see, the movement… then what we need to do is connect the equations to that. Not the other way around.”

 

“What do you mean?” I ask. “They did the whole throwing the ball and the videos and everything.”

 

She smiles, as if I’m encouraging her instead of objecting. “Yes. Exactly. They did. What if you do it?”  


And that’s how the most interesting physics lesson I have ever had begins. We throw darts at the board my dad installed on the wall facing my bed and Seda makes notes on the trajectories. She throws darts, too, supposedly so I can observe, but she is simply so terrible at it that the only thing I can focus on it’s how, for all she might know why the trajectory is what it is, she has no control of what her hands are doing. Her posture shifts unaccountably between throws and she seems completely unaware of how that will affect the force she can use and the angle at which she can move her own arm.  


It’s mystifying. It fits her, though. I thought I got her because I understood the chip on her shoulder, but now that the issue of excessive whiteness has been sorted, I still don’t get her. She’s looking at me almost too attentively. She agreed to take a seat on the bed to throw her darts from the right position, but she’s not comfortable there. She’s smiling and she’s laughed at my jokes and at her failed attempts both, but she’s clutching at the notebook where she’s diagramming the laws of physics like a shield. I lean over, more to see what she will do than because I want to look at the diagram again, and she immediately holds it closer to me but doesn’t let it or her hands make contact with me.

 

“It’s like this,” she says, tracing it with her index as my eyes follow along. “See?”  


And I do see. Maybe because I’m not trying, it suddenly becomes obvious. I see the dart moving through the air and I feel my muscles clenching. Acceleration equals force divided by mass.  


“Yes!” I exclaim and take the notebook from her hands, heedless of manners or of the fact that I have known her for a couple of hours. “Yes, I do see.”

 

She turns to look at me, too close all of a sudden, and I can see how long her eyelashes are, how smooth the skin of her cheeks. “That’s… good,” she says haltingly, lowering her eyes to the notebook once again. Then she exhales and continues, brisk and sure. “Now, look at this…”  


******

 

Walking gets old fast. It’s not just the low quality, it’s that I have been strictly forbidden to push myself even to a brisk walk. I can walk, slow and careful, and get nowhere fast. Not that I used to walk anywhere, I always preferred to save my energy for the pool, and what are free buses for? I didn’t even jog. When I did run, I liked running fast. Steady might win the race, but I didn’t want to win, I wanted to fly. After a couple blocks I just lean against a low garden wall and contemplate calling my brother for a ride back home instead of spending fifteen laborious minutes on the return journey. I don’t call. I walk another block, and another, till I’m breathless and sweaty with the effort and my knee hurts like a bitch. Then I find another low wall and breathe till I feel ok again and head back the whole ten blocks, hating every step, sore all over, and hoping for the rush of adrenaline that will eradicate all other feelings and thoughts. There’s no rush, or at least I miss it coming because when I’m aware of myself again my body is moving of its own accord. Of course that’s when I stumble, my brain having no business messing with what works so well on its own.

  


******

 

Seda comes back. It’s not that I didn’t expect her to, I mean, the session went well and I guess she’s agreed to do it in exchange for credit or something. But this time I’m looking forward to it, even as I dread the endless equations we have to go through. She greets me with a sunny smile and says, “I couldn’t talk your mother out of bringing us tea,” but her voice is bright and only slightly apologetic.  


I roll my eyes, kicking the other chair with my good leg so it rolls towards her. “I know, so British.”

 

“Indeed,” she replies with a perfect twinge of RP and a grin. She has a satchel slung over her shoulder and she gets out a spiral notebook. “I found my notes. I think it will help.”  


It does, or maybe she does. By the time the tea is gone, I have managed to get through a whole page of equations, Seda looking over my shoulder way more than occasionally. She smells of something flowery and of the minty chewing gum she popped into her mouth as soon as she was done with her own cuppa.

 

“Stop trying to think for me,” I tell her. “I will give it to you when I’m done.”  


“But I need to see how you think so I can fix it if it’s wrong,” she complains obstinately.

 

“Well, I need to concentrate without your hair on my face,” I reply, and watch her self-consciously tuck some of the little braids behind her ear. They fall back down almost instantly, framing her face like a curtain made of delicate cords. I look back down at my work before she catches me looking and don’t let myself look up when she starts rummaging in her bag.

 

She’s quiet till I’m done. Not unexpectedly, it turns out I have completely messed up the equation I was working on while we talked. I’m not exactly surprised; I haven’t been around people my age much in the last few months. Seda calls to me, my eyes and my ears and my attention wandering in her direction of their own accord. I wonder if it would feel that way with anybody, or if it’s something about her, about how easy it is to argue with her and how that makes me feel that I don’t have to be careful to keep my distance.

 

With my schedule, I was never exactly the life of the party, except maybe at professional meets where everybody else is even crazier than me about training and diet. I can't say I miss the girls and guys from the British team, and I haven’t seen any of them since it happened. I miss the way I felt with them, the way my passion, the one my classmates thought odd, suddenly made people look at me with admiration. I wasn’t doing it to be admired, but it was the only thing I wanted to be admired for. It meant more to have someone look at me with bright eyes because they understood and loved something I loved, something I had given myself willingly to.

 

And it was a nice break that that they got why I got up at five in the morning to have enough time to go to the pool before school, how I would miss the parties my classmates threw because I had a meet, how I didn’t date because I couldn’t spare the time for another person in my life. But what good is any of that now? They wouldn’t get this and I have lost that. Worse still, they would understand the nightmare I’m trapped in, viscerally and instinctively, and recoil from it. From me. I wouldn’t blame them. I want to.

 

My friends from school, Cara, Hanan, Dotty— I guess you could say I miss them. They never got why I was so crazy about swimming, but they were there in maths class when I pretended to faint so I wouldn’t get detention for falling asleep, and Dotty let me copy her notes afterwards. They were close enough to know that my brother was the one who was into swimming originally and that he’s a bit of a loose cannon but also a guy I can always count on. They weren't the kind of friends who knew my deepest secrets, and that was fine, I needed the kind of friends they were: the kind that knows how to tease you about your habit of having a chicken and bacon sandwich every single day for lunch, and to elbow you when it is your turn to read in class because they know your mind tends to wander. I was always alone, but thanks to them I rarely felt lonely.

 

Hell, I even miss school a little. Anybody would, I think, after week upon week of staring at blank walls — or, well, at tastefully painted walls with a very neat target once they let my parents take me home. My mom even lifted her lifelong ban on watching TV during the day till I was allowed to get back in the pool, but it turned out she was right, and most of it was crap. And what wasn’t… well, there aren’t enough seasons of Switched at Birth and Finding Carter —and it turns out my eyes can’t handle more than four episodes in a row anyway.

 

About two weeks after the surgery, my school mates came to the hospital, sat by me and talked about teachers and homework and normal stuff, and very carefully didn’t look down at the empty space under my blankets. Cara even showed up again after that first awkward visit, and I made damn sure to put a pillow under the blankets, it didn’t look anything like a leg, of course. But when I put it on top of my knees it tented the blanket enough that it seemed like they might both be still there under it, if she was willing to imagine it. She tried. But, I realise now, I don’t think I did. I was just too turned around, too disappointed with the universe, my luck, and especially the future. All possible futures, none of them the one of my dreams.

 

Seda looks over the rest of my work again, then turns to me and asks, “You do get it, right?”

  
“Yeah,” I nod. And we move on to the next set with negative numbers. She goes through one equation with me and then retreats to her own book, a thick physics book she’s underlining in bright pink.

 

This time not even glancing at my paper till I look up and ask her to. It only takes her a quick look to suggest, “You might want to check your answers. If I hadn’t checked mine last year, I would have failed.”

 

I heave a sigh. “You sound like a teacher,” I tease with an eye-roll.

 

She raises her eyebrows at me. “What did you think I was?”

  
******

 

Sooner rather than later, I push myself too far. I have been making such good progress with my walks that I overreach. In the pool, I could just float for a while, drift in the water and let my muscles unwind, but there’s no floating here and no amount of sitting seems to be helping with the deep ache in what’s left of my knee. The pain is not as intense as it was right after they started weaning me off the post-op painkillers, but it feels wrong in the same way, somehow. I take out my mobile and scroll till I find my brother’s name.

 

“Hey,” Ti greets me after about two rings, thank god he’s so attached to his phone.

 

“Hey,” I answer, “Are you home? I need a ride.”

 

“Why I am not surprised you are calling to ask for a favour?” he asks reprovingly even as I hear the jangle of keys.

 

“Because that’s the reason _you_ always have to call _me_?” I speculate. A mock argument with Ti is as good a distraction from my leg as anything. Now that I have given in and admitted I need help, it seems to throb. “I’m in front of the big Tesco’s.”

 

I assume he’s registered my location and let him keep the argument going by insisting with perfect equanimity. “Me? I haven’t asked for anything in ages.”

 

“Seriously?” I ask, “You made me cover up for you when you forgot to clean your room _two days ago._ ”

 

“That was just dumping everything in the closet,” Ti says, car door clicking shut.

 

“ _Exactly._ ” I reply, getting into it. “Everything included your dirty clothes! It smelled like something had died, then something else had eaten whatever had died and died from food poisoning.”

 

He laughs at my description, “Well, you don’t like closets. I was only giving you a chance to get back at mine.”

 

“Are you close?” I ask, rolling my eyes even though he can’t see me. My brother was the debate champion, I swear.

 

A few minutes later he stops the car on the other side of the road, I signal at him to come closer and he calls me instead, “You can’t cross the street?”

 

“No, I fucking can’t,” I snap at him, even as a try to straighten my left leg and wince at the result. “That’s why I asked you to come get me.”

 

He backs off, “Woah, ok. Sorry. BRB.”

 

It takes Ti a few minutes to turn the car around and double park in front of me. It’s a terrible spot but the windowsills of the store are big enough for me to sit on and that’s all I had cared about earlier.

 

Ti jogs up to me and then leans over, putting a hand on my arm, “What’s wrong? Am I taking you home or to the hospital?”

 

I shrug, “I don’t know. Home, I guess. I will give the doctor a call but I don’t want to wait for ages at the A&E to talk to someone who’s got never seen…” I wave down at my leg.

 

“Ok,” he says, “do you want me to carry you?” I meet his eyes, concerned and open. I don’t think I could say yes to anybody else, but it’s Ti. Ti, who said ‘want’ and not ‘need’ even though we both know which it is. Ti, who asks me when he needs my help without doubting I will give it. So I nod and put my arms around his neck when he puts his under me and pulls up me with a grunt of effort. He walks over to the co-pilot’s door and waits till I get my right foot down to open the door for me, not stepping out of my reach till I’m sitting down.

 

“I’m putting you on a diet,” he declares as he closes his own door and starts the car. “No more protein for you, Mermaid.”

 

******

 

Mum’s back from work when we get home, which I would count as bad luck any time I was not in this much pain. She sits me down and helps me take the prosthetic off. Then hands me one of my dad’s gigantic sport shirts to cover up my bare legs and a cup of aspirin tea practically simultaneously.

 

“I should have known this would happen,” she laments watching me drink. It’s not a recrimination, exactly, but I still don’t answer.

 

Ti attracts her attention by asking, “Do you think we should switch bedrooms again?”

 

I’m about to refuse when my mum shakes her head, “No, better if Shla is upstairs, close to everything she can possibly need.”

 

She might as well add ‘and far from the exit’ but what’s the point in arguing? I want my own bed and my mum means well, as annoying as her nagging can get. It’s a relief to have her there to call the doctor and tell him what happened; now that I’m done pushing, I’m not just in pain, I’m so tired I feel dizzy. I lay back on the living room sofa, and Ti passes me a cushion to prop up my leg so that the stump doesn’t touch anything.

 

******

 

The doctor said rest up and that I’m banned from walking for a few days, or that might be my mum, but I’m not stupid: I messed up and now I have gotta pay the price, it’s that simple. It would be even stupider to pretend I have any choice in the matter, the way my whole family seems to have tensed up as if this is the other shoe dropping, as if it’s the accident all over again. I let my dad carry me upstairs when he gets home and I dutifully take a crutch to get myself down for breakfast the next morning without complaint. My knee doesn’t hurt anymore, but if it makes them feel better, it’s not much to ask. Of course, being officially stuck inside starts me thinking on all the things I want to do outside. Thankfully it’s only a few days, and, in a way, it’s good to have a reason to get off my metaphorical arse and call give Cara a call. We haven’t really talked in months.

 

I expect her to be on her lunch period, but she must have her phone on mute because she doesn’t answer. I drop the phone on my bed and open _A View From the Bridge_. I’m deeply absorbed, frowning at everything Eddie is saying when the slow dance song of my ring-tone starts playing. I put the book face down on the bed and roll to get the phone.

 

“Hello,” I say, not checking the caller ID but hoping for Cara.

 

“Shla!” she greets me happily. “I couldn’t believe you’d really called! I haven’t heard from you in ages.”

 

“I commented on Facebook,” I offer.

 

“Oh, come on, Facebook is for pictures,” she replies, not buying it. Cara’s kind and caring but she’s not one to put up with bullshit.

 

“Ok, I don’t know, it’s been…” I sigh. “Boring, you would believe how boring. I didn’t feel like calling and saying that.”

 

“But you are calling now,” she points out.

 

“I got my prosthetic, I have done enough PT that I can walk some. Go out.”

 

“That’s great,” she says sincerely. “Wait, you want to go out?”

 

“I like going out,” I argue. I’m a little offended by her skepticism. “I was just always too busy for it.”

 

“You were busy because you wanted to be busy.”

 

“Yeah, still busy.”

 

“But you are not now?” she checks, a little hesitantly.

  
I roll over onto my back and close my eyes. “I’m swimming in the mornings, but they don’t want me to overdo it. I have to sit my exams, and my parents… Well, in their own words: I should work with my brain while I get my body up to speed.”

 

Cara snorts as indelicately as a bull. It’s less incongruous on the phone when you can’t see what a slim fairy like creature she is. “Your parents and their sayings…”

  
“Don’t tell me.”

 

“I won’t,” she agrees. “So you can hang out. Wait till the guys hear that not only are you alive and kicking but you actually want to do something fun.”

  
“Kindly fuck off,” I suggest. And she kinda does, but only because she needs to eat something fast before afternoon classes start. Before hanging up, she promises to call me with a plan sometime this week. I put the phone down next to me and just stare at the humidity stains on my ceiling, feeling unaccountably accomplished.

 

*******

 

Cara is our activist. Not that I think every group has one! Far from it, I’m well aware of how rare Cara is. She’s the one who taught me to see the invisible lines all around us. The one who gave me a name for the squint people got when my mum took me to the doctor or even just shopping for bras. The one who opened my eyes to how many men’s gaze would slide to Hanan as the spokesperson when the four of us walked into a shop to ask about a phone. It hurt to know, but it helped, too. Having a word for it, knowing it wasn’t just me. No, knowing it _wasn’t_ me, that it wasn’t that I was doing, or worse, that I _was_ , the wrong thing… it just made it a little easier.

 

Other than being a girl, Cara has no claim to any minorities, but at fifteen she already wanted to attend rallies for pretty much any issue being protested by anybody, and a few that only she could see as problematic. For a time, I thought she felt guilty for being so normal, then I understood she was angry because she _looked_ it. While everybody else fought against things being hard because they were darker or more Muslim or less pretty; Cara was fighting for her outside looks not too make everything easy for her. Nobody wants to be just a label, not even if the label is ‘perfect’. It took me a long time not just to understand but to truly believe that looking the way she did when she felt the way she felt was a curse of its own. Last year, she decided to change her looks to match and dyed her glorious blond hair to five different shades of blue; her parents retaliated by grounding her till she agreed to get it ‘fixed’. But that wasn’t really the worst way in which it backfired, since Cara was Cara and she had gotten it done by a professional, the strange hair only made her good look otherworldly. Walking around with her had often required some glaring to get idiots to get lost but the hair made them think they had good reason to stop us on our way home from school and demand to speak with Cara. Not just good reason, but a right to her attention. After all, she had _made_ herself different, what other reason could she have than being looked at by them?

 

Cara had looked like she wanted to punch the guys sprouting such bullshit but she had just said, “Let’s go.”

 

We had walked straight into her bedroom without meeting anyone and Cara had gone into her en suite bathroom and returned with hair tools, including scissors.

 

She looked between the three of us and finally asked me, “Will you braid it tight for me?”

 

It wasn’t that I was an expert, but I like braids because they keep my hair out of the way without putting too much weight on my head. Still, there was so much hair that I had had Hanan hold the extra strands for me while I pulled it tighter. “Done,” I’d told her, tying the en off with a hair-band.

 

“Dot,” Cara had said in a thick voice. “Cut it off, please.”

 

“Do you _want_ to be grounded forever _?_ ” Hanan had asked, sounding horrified. Cara had shrugged, her parents’ rage didn’t seem to affect her. I didn’t get it, and I was kind of jealous that she was free from the fear that never really left me. I didn’t think my parents would take back their love back because they had adopted me instead of had me; it was impossible to argue with the way my mum got so upset when people asked her if I was her kid that she would cry when telling my dad about it. Or the way my dad sued the school when a teacher hadn’t believed he was my father when he’d tried to come pick me up. Or their pride, the way their eyes glowed when I got up on a podium, and how they would argue any head teacher down if exams got in the way of training even as they warned me that I had better get a decent grade in the retake.

 

When my parents got angry with me, I listened. Sometimes I didn’t get it, but I knew with a faith I had in little else that they were angry because they loved me. Of course, my parents wouldn’t care what colour my hair was, it had actually been my trainer who had warned me off piercings because they looked unprofessional.

 

Later, I came to understand that for Cara, her parents’ disappointment only proved they didn’t understand the things Cara believed in. It could no more change their attitude than she could change theirs. It was as inevitable as rain and just as worth worrying over.

 

Dot had come over from where she had been snooping in Cara’s bookshelves and crouched in front of us to look at Cara in the face. “You sure?”

 

Cara had nodded and Dot had made us move out of the way before she set scissors at the top of my beautiful braid and slowly lowered the blades. The hair opened up like a fan of eyelashes for the endless minute it took the scissors to chop through the thick base of the braid. My eyes were stuck on the braid so when it was done and Cara, feeling the weight gone, shook her head; I was shocked all over again to see her face reframed once again.

 

She still looked beautiful. It couldn’t be helped.

 

 

******

  


After a brief knock, Seda walks into my room looking exhausted. I have seen her almost every day this week and the last three school days last week, too. But I have to admit that if I had never laid eyes on her before, I would still know. She’s not a small girl, a little taller than me even, but right now a strong breeze would have a fair chance of toppling her. She’s blinking heavily to make herself keep her eyes open, and there are shadows under her eyes that have nothing to do with smudged make up.

  
“Wow, mate, you look knackered,” I say, and she twists her mouth at me with that little moue that spelling mistakes bring out on her. “What?”

 

“Don’t call me ‘mate’,” she says, closing the door behind her and letting her satchel drop to the floor while she lets herself drop on her chair.

  
“Why not?”

 

“I don’t like the sound of it,” she says simply.

 

Now, that’s a new one! I have heard people object to the meaning of words, and like, the symbolism or whatever, but the sound? “Not the meaning?” I ask.

 

She shrugs. “Nothing wrong with the meaning as far as I know.” She rubs her face firmly and shakes her head.

 

I lean forward, making sure to distribute the weight correctly between both my legs before I settle my elbows on my thighs. “What happened to you?”

 

She looks up, although it would probably be more accurate to say that she opens her eyes. “I had a test.”

 

“A test?” I repeat like a moron. She looks like she had a marathon. Then I realise what she must mean. “So you stayed up studying?”

 

“Yeah, that’s why I cancelled yesterday.”

 

“You didn’t cancel,” I correct her. “You come when you can, that’s what we agreed. Anyway, you will be proud of me. I finished the book.”

 

This does make her smile, tiredly, but I’m expecting no miracles. “Yeah?”

 

“Yes, you were right,” I admit grudgingly, “it was good.”

  
“Of course I was right. Why do you think she became a bestseller?” As soon as this opinion is out, she starts drooping again.

  
“Ok,” I say, springing up with nary a snatch from my leg. I’m getting better at it; even more important, I don’t need to think about it anymore all the time. “I’m making you some coffee.”

 

It takes her a moment to process this, but when she does her eyes drop to my leg, the left one. Somehow, she knows. She stands as well, hands up and expression alarmed. “No, it’s fine, you don’t have to.”

  
I ignore her look. “I do have to, you are clearly exhausted.”

  
“Then I will make it,” she says and I’m quiet, because how can I explain that I don’t want to be coddled? We have never even mentioned my leg before. I have pretended to be fine and she’s pretended not to know. “Shla?” she asks after the silence goes on too long. And then she says it, “I don’t want to make you go down and up the stairs.”

 

I raise my eyes to her own, apologetic but determined. “I live here,” I say. “I have to go up and down the stairs every day. I will have to go and up the stairs all my life.”

 

I did spend a while in my brother’s bedroom downstairs when I first came home, but I didn’t want to give up my room. I had given up enough as it was—and besides, Ti likes to play music till 3AM and my parents like to go to bed at 11.

  
Seda seems startled by this objection. “But it’s hard for you, isn’t it?”

  
I shrug. “It’s harder. But it gets easier with practice.”

  
She sits back down. “I would like tea, please. With sugar.”

  
I stare, surprised. My parents and my doctors and my coach are so convinced they know what’s better for my recovery that it seems amazing to have someone simply give in to my wishes. Just take my word for it. I open the door but stop in the threshold. Only then, with my back to her, I admit, “I do need help carrying the mugs back up.”

 

I hear her chair scrape against the floor and head down the hallway towards the stairs. Only then I realise she’ll see me do this, she’ll get undeniable proof of... Seda stops behind me, not speaking, even though she must not be in the mood to wait for me to get over myself. I take hold of the railing and brace myself on my right leg before shifting my left hip forward and carefully placing the prosthetic on the next step. At this point walking is not that awkward anymore, but stairs remain unnatural without two feet to push with and lean on. I keep tight hold of the railing, even though I haven't stumbled in a while, and do it again. When I'm two steps down, I feel Seda take the first step down.

  
I bring my right foot down on the next step. Standing with both feet on the same step I feel secure enough of my balance to half turn my head towards her. "You can go ahead," I say. "The kettle should be obvious enough."

  
She comes down till she's only one step behind me and I realise she can't go past unless I let go of the wall on that side. My fingers clench on the railing, instinctively resisting the notion of giving up the extra protection having my dominant hand against the wall offers, but I make myself pull it back and shuffle to the left, tightening my grip on that railing instead.

 

"I don't think…" Seda starts to say, sounding uncomfortable. She's right, of course. The stairs aren't that wide. It's possible to walk by someone if the two people involved can simultaneously manoeuvre around each other, but she can't go down without more than brushing against me. I shudder at the thought of what could happen if I lost my balance, and Seda's hand shoots out to take hold of my arm. I look up at her, surprised.

  
She is very close and her blush is even more obvious under the glare of the artificial light —but she doesn't let go. "Thought you were going to fall," she explains, licking her lips.

  
I lower my eyes to her arm. "If you hold me while you move down, I will be ok, and maybe we can get some tea before it's time for dinner."

 

"Okay," she agrees, easy but not fast, and I suspect she understands what it costs me to ask, to trust her like this.

 

She sidesteps onto my step, her back pressed to the wall but still close enough that her front is brushing the arm she's holding by the elbow. Her shirt is soft against my bare skin and although she shouldn't be feeling much, her grip tightens for a moment and she lets out a shaky breath. I keep my eyes on the railing, my heart battering my ribcage. I am not afraid, I realise. She won’t let me fall. She takes another step down and places herself in front of me, feet apart for improved balanced, hand still on me. She watches me a moment longer, eyes dark despite the light, colour too high on her cheeks, and then slowly opens her hand, not moving her body out of the way till I gather my wits and put my hand to the wall again.

  
"Thanks," I mumble, too breathless by half.

  
"For what? I'm the one who needs tea," she replies and steps backwards without even holding onto the railing. I am looking down already so I can't help but see the easy movement of her legs, hips and torso. I can't ignore the utter lack of hesitancy, not the product of arduous training or deliberate practice; simply the human body working as it should. I turn my face aside, suddenly so angry my grip on the railing becomes more a desperate struggle for calm than balance. I want it back. I need it back. I can't take twenty minutes going down some stairs for the rest of my life, even worse when I get older and my body has to pay the price of age and injury. I just can’t. Seda must see some of this in my face, because her voice is higher than usual when she says my name. "Shla?"

 

"Go," I manage to grit out between clenched teeth. And after a moment, she does, getting her legs out of my sight almost as if she knows it is beyond her to do anything but hurt me right now.

 

Once she's gone the fury dissipates, rapidly replaced by defeat. I can't change a thing, after all. That's what makes me angrier than anything. After spending my life setting myself goals that seemed unreachable but weren't, competing against the odds but conscious I could still win. I have now been placed here by chance, with no odds at all, no hard road to travel. I can't get to Rome, I can't get anywhere. I have specialized in beating those odds, but now I am out of the running altogether, I have already lost without being allowed to try out. It is so unfair, so fucking unfair that this is happening to me... There's plenty of people in the world who need their legs less than I do. How many kids my age spend more than twenty hours a week training? How many people at all push their bodies to do everything they can? How many people have the grit to become more than what they were given when they were born?

  
It’s not even just that. It’s that, quite simply, of all the things that could be taken from me this is by far the one I needed most.

  
I concentrate on breathing, on the feeling of the railing in my hand, smooth and polished, the metal holding the wood in place colder than I would have guessed. The wall is gritty, spiky with some fancy painting technique. It helps a little, but I don't have much else to touch at hand and this is as far as I got with the shrink my parents made me go see before I started making up excuses to meet our sessions. I open my eyes, looking for black things but ignoring my own shoes. My tank top. The shadowed corner under the light fixture. The logo etched high up on my trouser leg— And then I’m Ok. Ok to try again.

  


******

  


When I get to the kitchen, Seda almost drops the cup she's holding. It's chamomile, I can smell it from here.

 

"That's not going to keep you awake," I tell her and she looks strangely guilty, eyes lowered, body hunched.

 

"I don't think I need any more stimulants in my blood," she replies a little shortly.

 

I stare. Maybe it isn’t guilt making her look away. "Did I— Did I scare you?"

  
"You startled me," she corrects, eyes straying from my face. "Woke me right up."

  
"I'm sorry," I tell her. I think I did a little more than ‘startle’ her.

 

"God, Shla, don't be sorry. I can't begin to imagine—" She shakes her head.

  
No, not _this_. She was acting like it didn’t matter earlier, like she was trying to be considerate and nothing more. "I see how it is," I say, interrupting. "I can't be sorry but you can."

  
She doesn't answer, just exhales and asks, "What are you sorry for?"

  
I hesitate. "Startling you."

 

"Ok,” she says, meeting my eyes and giving a firm nod, “then I am sorry if I upset you. I didn't mean to."

 

"You didn't," I say honestly. And it’s true, it wasn’t her, it was her body. The existence of that body, proof that normality still existed in the world even now that it’s been taken out of my reach forever. “I need some coffee,” I say, turning towards the kettle. After the stairs, walking feels almost easy. There’s a cup next on the counter with a spoon inside, so I just need to get the coffee from the cupboard and spoon some in, pour some water and breathe deep. The smell relaxes my shoulder muscles a little and the first sip a little more.

 

“So you are one of those coffeeholics,” Seda comments from the other side of the kitchen where I left her.

 

“More like a fan,” I say, finding a smile for her. “A devoted fan.”

  
Her laughter is high and not entirely amused. There’s still a ragged edge there I haven’t smoothed over with my apology.

 

“Do you want to take a nap?” I offer.

 

“What?”

  
“You haven’t had any tea,” I point out. “I don’t think it’s a good idea for you to cycle home in the dark when you are falling asleep standing up.”

  
“I’m not falling asleep anymore.”

  
“But you will, as soon as the shock wears off,” I tell her, smiling my best teasing smile but perfectly serious.

 

She glances through to the living room. “I really can’t. I mean, I know you mean well but your family could come back anytime and…”

 

This startles me into a laugh. I can’t help it. “I mean upstairs, in my room,” I explain when she turns to me with a frown. If my initial offer confused her, this one leaves her speechless. “I will be down here, can’t be arsed to go back up for a while, so…”

 

“But you need to study,” Seda objects, clutching her cup and taking a tiny sip, as if she’s afraid to have her mouth full of liquid when she needs to make a rebuttal.

  
“My computer is down here. Didn’t you tell me to do background reading on Eliot?”

 

The prospect of me reading up seems to do the trick because she thanks me and takes her tea upstairs.

  


******

  


My mum offers to go up to my room to wake her up when it’s dinner time, but I refuse, braving the stairs myself. It’s harder than it used to be, but with the railing making falling unlikely; it only takes about twice as long. I rest for a moment at the top and then head to my bedroom.  When I open the door, the first thing I notice is that the bed is empty, then that Seda’s curled up on my sofa with my grandmother’s afghan over her shoulders. I almost can’t bring myself to wake her. She’s sleeping so deeply, dark lashes covering the circles under her eyes with their shadows, her face openly naked without her glasses, her body lax and easy in a way that it rarely is when she’s awake.

 

I put my left hand down on the sofa’s arm so I can lean forward and shake her, but when I extend my right hand it doesn’t land on her shoulder; instead, I find myself brushing her braids away from her face. She shifts under my fingers, her skin unbelievably soft, and I pull my hand back but I can’t look away. She doesn’t wake, but I still feel like a creep. I’m not surprised, to be honest, not at all. I hadn’t thought of this, but I knew it. I think maybe it isn’t only me feeling this pull, but it doesn’t matter, she’s asleep and can’t stop me. It’s not fair of me to betray her trust like this. I push myself upright.

  
“Seda,” I say, and it comes out a little louder than I intended but Seda still doesn’t move so I say it again.

 

 _Stop being stupid_ , I tell myself and almost fall down when I lean in to shake her shoulder, quick and through the afghan. I straighten just as she opens her eyes, then closes them again against the light coming in through the open door.

 

“Sorry,” I say, but not for what. “Dinner will be ready soon.”

  
That makes her sit up straight and pat around herself in desperation. “Dinner?” she croaks, the afghan falling off her in her frantic search, her eyes looking huge in her face. “But I set my alarm—” She finally locates her phone at her feet. It’s dead. She sighs, pressing the ON key with a hopeless look. “Do you have a charger for this?”

 

I extend my hand for it and nod. “You go first,” I tell her, pointing at the door, looking at the phone way more closely than I need to for something as simple as plugging a wire into it. “I will be down in a minute.”  


From the corner of my eye, I see her get off the sofa and fold the afghan with quick, efficient movements before heading for the door. When she walks by the mirror, though, she stops short, making a dissatisfied noise that makes me turn fully her way. With her shirt rucked up and her hair dishevelled, she’s a sight to behold.

  
Not the same as a sight I _should_ behold, though. I like her, yes—maybe more than I thought— but I need her help if I want to have any chance of passing my exams. I can’t risk this. I’m not even sure I want to. What would I have to look forward to besides my morning swim if she freaked out and stopped coming? I have seen her look at me, and I know she gets fidgety or freezes when I'm too close, but that doesn't mean she wants to feel that way, that she can handle the idea of wanting it, much less doing something about wanting it. What was she told before she came here? What are the stories of women like me in places like that? Is it discrimination for me to think like this because I need to be smart to be safe from discrimination? Not that I’m safe here, not even I can manage to stay disconnected enough from the world around me to believe that but I know it’s worse almost everywhere else, dead worse sometimes and... I just can't take it, not now. My doctor won’t give me the go ahead for full-time training for ages yet, maybe not till after I sit my exams if my parents have any say in it. The idea of being left alone in this room again makes me want to beg. I don't need to beg, though, just keep my hands to myself and my mouth shut.

  
I had so much before that I never needed to be careful. The only thing I couldn’t live without was swimming. No, not just swimming— swimming to the best of my ability, swimming till my body gave out, till I knew that if I lost a race it was not because I had not given it my absolute devotion and attention. There was little room for anything else, either in my body or my mind. I had thoughts and I had feelings, my skin woke up when certain people got close, but that was all. I was happy that was all; I didn’t want to run around after some girl and make a fool of myself over teenage relationships that couldn’t last.

  
Now, though, I need more than the measly challenge of not swimming in circles and not letting the pain that shoots through the leg that is no longer there distract me. I need Seda, and not just for the studying. She makes me happy. I don't like that it’s something I don’t control that makes me feel good about myself but her pride in my accomplishments makes me believe I can do something good out of the water. I need that. At least until I can have the water back as more than a distraction.

 

I need the grades more than I ever have, too. They aren’t my backup plan now that plans A through Z are out. School is probably all I have. And six months ago, I would have said that was less than nothing, but now— I can see a world in which I pass my exams, in which I read books and like them, and speak in class without being prompted and get rewarded for it. In which I am good enough to have choices that don’t depend on how fast I am.

 

The path was so clear before, unquestioned and unquestionable because it wasn’t possible to argue with passion. Now that’s lost — not my passion, of course, but the path where it could take me forward. I will go back to the pool, no matter what, but I don’t have any say on whether I’ll ever be able to compete professionally again. Seda has made me notice, though, after a lifetime of seeing only the water, that there are other things in the world. I don't want to lose that. I don't want to lose her.

  
So I wave Seda to go ahead, and then change my shirt. It’s pretty sweaty, but I don’t mind clean sweat much myself and I probably wouldn’t have bothered if I didn’t need a reason to be away from her for a little longer.

 

******

 

Cara does call, not that she normally doesn’t keep her word, it’s just that I’m feeling a little weird about seeing her again after so long. Cara is not someone I ever wanted to let down and the girl is not afraid to judge so it’s hard to tell myself I have no reasons to worry.

 

But it’s easier to be back with them than I imagined, she plans it soft-core: we meet up at the shopping centre for lunch and conversation. I find them lingering near the north entrance where they promised they would be, it’s not cold yet and Hanan likes to smoke before a long period of abstinence. He greets me with a heartfelt squeeze, the smell of smoke clinging to him even though there’s no cancer stick in sight. Dotty just grins at me, but I know it’s genuine because it exposes the dimples she hates so much. Cara, though, gives me a look and demands. “Come give me a hug, bitch.”

 

And I do. I mean, I kinda owe her after mostly ignoring her for months. And for being here, after all those months, after all these years. She’s small in my arms, but she almost makes my back pop when she embraces me back.

 

We take the escalator to the food court because that’s the only possible option. Nobody has to ask me if I have any special needs. Here everything is automated to cater to the laziest, most complacent parts of human nature. It’s maybe one of the only places in the city where I have to do nothing differently than everybody else. I don’t even mind that Dotty is wearing a mini-dress that exposes her perfect legs because I always thought my swimmer legs looked too muscular for such revealing clothes. Watching Dotty tap the heel of her boot against the ground while we wait in line for pizza I realise I will never have to try and convince my mom that I’m not a dress person ever again. It’s so strange to realise that something good can come of this, that I can find a silver lining. Not even that, that good things will happen even if I don’t look for them, just like bad ones do. Dotty turns around and raises an eyebrow at me. “Stop checking me out, Shla,” she warns, mock menacing.

 

I smile and give her an easy shrug. “Can’t help myself.”

 

Hanan gives her a look and then nods at me, “I know the feeling,” he agrees with a wistful look, unwisely close to the girl he’s admiring. She elbows him a little too hard to be friendly and he takes a step back, wincing and complains, “It was an honest compliment!”

 

Cara rolls her eyes at them. “Dot, you made Hanan buy a sleeveless tank top last time we came here.”

 

“He _asked_ me for advice,” she insists, overly prim but with a gleam of amusement in her eyes.

 

Cara hums thoughtfully and concedes, “I suppose that does make a difference.”

 

Hanan lets out an indignant yelp while I laugh and Dotty gives him a superior look, declaring, “The Judge has spoken.”

 

I guess things are going so smoothly that it seems natural to Hanan to bring up the reason for my long absence. “How’s the PT going?” he asks, casually glancing up from the ice-cream he’s methodically eating, layer by layer disappearing as he sculpts what looks like the smoothest mountain ever dreamed.

 

I freeze, pressing my left knee down hard onto the prosthetic. I feel Cara turn towards me but it’s Hanan who prompts me, “Shla? Did I say something wrong?”

 

I swallow, “No.” It’s not like my family doesn’t ask, and naturally both my coach and my doctors do, but I have been feeling so _normal_ all morning. It’s not that I haven’t been thinking about it, every step I take, everything I see is changed by my own transformation. I hadn’t thought _they_ were, though. I thought my normal act as well as my clothes would be enough to hide it. I thought for them, I was still me. “You just surprised me,” I say and I hate how hoarse my voice sounds.

 

“I just…” Hanan extends a hand across the table and softly graces his fingers against my hand. I look up at him. “We are catching up, and it’s what you are doing, isn’t it?”

 

“Don’t be ridiculous,” Dotty interrupts, “What she is _doing_ is studying, same as us.”

 

I shake my head, “No, Hanan’s right. I am doing physical therapy. And studying,” I add with a conciliatory look at Dot. “There’s just not much to say, I guess. What you see is what you get,” I wave a hand down my body, “I can walk.”

 

For a moment I fear another question about it, but Cara comes to my rescue. “Can you pass your tests?” she asks, and I must look a bit alarmed because she turns to the other two and starts orchestrating a solution to a problem she’s barely glimpsed. “We could…”

 

“I’m fine,” I tell them, sharing a resigned smile with Hanan and Dot, Cara just can’t stop herself from tackling any problem to the ground. “Actually, the school sent someone to help me. She’s great.”

 

Hanan raises interested eyebrows at me, “Is she hot?”

 

Dot groans at that, “I’m sure that’s what matters to Shla, not if she knows how to explain physics.”

 

Her choice of subject is unfortunate because Hanan goes right ahead and makes the requisite ‘physical’ joke and Cara joins in to mockingly beg him to at least make some _new_ dirty jokes. Nobody notices when I turn around to rummage in my bag, suddenly in desperate need of something. Anything really, if it gives me a moment for my blush to subside.

 

I pay dearly for the distraction when I turn around only for Dot to suggest, perfectly straight faced, that I invite my marvellous tutor to hang out with us. I try to explain that Seda has her own studying to do, and her own friends and hobbies but there’s not much force to my objections.

 

The truth is that she’s never mentioned anything but studying and books to me, not even her family. And not because she’s distant with me, on the contrary, she’s willing to talk about some pretty private subjects. Like how amazing everything is here, how much there is of _everything_ but also how wasteful everybody is; how much she misses home sometimes anyway, how things not just look different but smell completely foreign and food never tastes quite right no matter how carefully she follows the recipe. She’s even spoken of her annoyance at being better read than her classmates but being stuck with a noticeably foreign accent and finding herself unable to pronounce words she knows well in writing. Thinking of that I start to rethink my refusal; wouldn’t she like my friends? Surely Cara’s activism would be a big hit and Dot is a total nerd under the trendy clothes, even Hanan... Hanan is really attractive, objectively speaking. I eye him dubiously, would Seda like him? I shouldn’t care, not when I have decided not to say anything anyway. I tell them I will ask her if she’s free next time I see her, planning to forget to even as the words leave my mouth.

 

 

******  


Silence doesn’t really do it. I don't say anything to Seda. I certainly don’t say anything to Hanan, who thinks teasing is the way to support his friends’ attempts at romance. I don’t even tell Cara. I don’t say anything to anybody because as long as it’s only in my head, it’s just a crush. Except crushes should be fun, they are meant to make you feel fuzzy and giddy when you see the person, someone you don’t see often or know well. It could be a crush, but I have never felt anything remotely romantic or sexual for anybody I wasn’t already close to. And every day I know Seda a little better and although I know it’s not likely, all I learn about her is good. The almost coquettish tilt of her head when I get daring in my essays, her incandescent hatred of all isms and even her anger, rare as a diamond and just as cutting. I had never thought of anger that way before, but hers leaves me in awe, because it takes so much out of her, her eyes bright and her mouth pursed. Her fury is an almost purifying force she lets loose, so blindingly honest, so terribly intimate, so revealing of the pain she’s suffered that it makes me want to join her in it, to destroy all that is unfair and cruel in the world so it can never touch her again. I just sit and listen, though, a little afraid of how angry I can get, of how loud I can be, of what I could do if I really thought about it. She reminds me of Cara that way, except Cara was so profoundly unhappy because of what she could see and so few others understood. Angry enough to lash out, angry enough to give into it, angry enough to scare me.

 

Seda is different. She’s not out of control; it takes her a few moments, but when my mom’s knock interrupts her rant, she takes a few deep breaths and opens it for her, smile a little shaky but there. It’s hard to say what I admire most: the feeling or her unshakable control over it. But it all comes down to the same, in the end: I have known her for barely a month, and I feel completely overwhelmed by even the smallest of her actions. Even when I try to concentrate on studying, with every assignment I’m more impressed with how much she knows and how much she can tell me about what she knows. How she seems to transform the world into a place that makes sense again. Not just the world I knew but the rest of it as well, the parts I wasn’t seeing, the parts I thought weren’t even worth looking at.

 

******

 

I feel a little guilty about it but I do it anyway. In the end, I figure, it doesn’t matter if I’m hanging out with Cara, Dot and Hanan because I need someone to get me out of the house and some reason to cancel on Seda the day after I dream about her. I mean, they get to see me and I get to see them. And I’m sure Seda can use the time to concentrate on her own studies.

 

“…and Shla is not listening.”

 

I turn to Dot, “What?”

 

She laughs and asks Hanan, “See what I mean?”

 

I turn to him, “What’s with her?”

 

“You weren’t listening,” says Hanan patiently and having him agreeing with Dot is a sure sign that something’s wrong.

 

I look down, “Sorry, I… I spaced out.”

 

“Duh,” Dot says, “but why?”

 

I must look reluctant because he insists, “Oh, come on, you can tell _us_.”

 

“Er.. I kinda have a crush,” I admit and I swear I can _hear_ Hanan’s shit-eating grin expanding on his face.

 

“Aha! I knew it.”

 

“Everybody knew it,” Dot says, “It’s obvious you are thinking of something else.”

 

“Great, you are a detective, now shut up, I want her to tell us about it.”

 

I shrug, “Well, that’s it, really. I’m a bit…” I gesture vaguely because I don’t know how to finish that. Nervous? Uncomfortable? Afraid?

 

Dot shakes her head at me. “That can’t be it, Shla, we don’t even know who you have a crush on.”

 

Hanan clicks his tongue, “Her tutor!”

 

I don’t say anything but I don’t try to hide my blush either and from Hanan’s gleeful exclamation it is plenty answer.

 

“Huh,” Dot says thoughtfully. “I thought it might be Cara.”

 

My eyes snap to her face at that, “What?”

 

She raises her hands defensively. “No offense, girl. Just… something that crossed my mind.”

 

“Cara is straight,” I tell her, not realising what I’m implying. I can see it in Dot’s face that she’s not missed my slip but she nods and not even Hanan says something insensitive. I let my eyes slide away, “I mean, I don’t think Seda is. I hope not, at least. But maybe she’s lonely.”

 

“It sounds like you need an ego boost if you think the only reason a pretty girl would hang out with you it’s that she’s lonely.”

 

“No, it’s just that she comes every day, or almost. I don’t think that’s what she agreed to with the school, originally?” My voice rises into a question. “It doesn’t sound right, she’s got tests, too.”

 

Dot frowns. “How old is she exactly?”

 

“She’s in Year 13, A levels.”

 

“And she’s got time to tutor you _every day_?” she asks, incredulous.

 

I shrug. “So it does sound a little weird to you,” I conclude.

 

Hanan laughs. “A little weird? That’s like a… a declaration. Like roses, only in books or something.”

 

I nod, starting to feel somewhat hopeful. “So maybe she…”

 

“No maybe, definitely!” Hanan insists.

 

Dot is more cautious. “At the very least she likes you _a lot._ ”

 

“Oh, come on,” complains Hanan. “ _Every day._ ” He glances at me, “For how long?”

 

I pretend to have to think about it, but in truth I have counted the days in a calendar already. “Five weeks, almost. I mean, she didn’t come that much at the beginning but she has for… for weeks now.”

 

Hanan shoots Dot a look that dares her to refute that, and she sighs and concedes, “Ok. Almost certainly.”

 

And from Dot, that’s a ringing endorsement.

 

 

******

  


I look up from the book I haven’t been able to read since Seda dropped onto the sofa next to me. Hanan and Dot are right. I know it. I know what they are saying makes sense. But Seda’s so close I can feel her warmth through our clothes and even if I’m right, that doesn’t guarantee she won’t get up and walk out.

 

“So what are you getting from this?” I ask, and it comes out too harsh but I can’t take it back. I can’t go to sleep tonight with the same questions in my head.

 

She looks up from her own book, clearly at a loss. “What?”

  
“The school sent you here in exchange for something, right? What is it?”

  
“Well,” she leans back a little to study my face, “I volunteered, so I get to say I have experience.”

  
“You volunteered? So you can put that you volunteer in your CV? That’s it?” I frown at her. “You have been coming every day for—” I pretend to try to remember. “Almost four weeks?”

 

“Well, you said you had time,” Seda says, averting her eyes.

 

“I do,” I reply. Nothing but time, that’s my life now. “But what about you?”

  
She forces a smile, shifting her shoulders as if to try and get comfortable. She’s still facing me but her eyes can’t seem to make contact long enough for our gazes to meet. “This is good for me. Revising the basics, and not so basics anymore,” she adds with a sideway glance.

 

I ignore the friendly jibe. “Don’t you have your own studying to do?” I ask, looking at her face. She’s doodling on the margins of her notebook, pretending this is casual. “Or friends you want to see?”

  
She’s silent for a moment at that, lips parted, and I don’t miss how her pen pauses for the smallest of seconds. “Um— Yes, I do study. I mean, obviously. A levels aren’t easy.”

  
“When do you study?” I press. “You are here every afternoon, and you have stayed for dinner a few times, even.”

  
“I study here,” she says, and it’s true enough. When I sit down with a set of equations after she’s gone through them with me or when I’m writing essay questions, she takes her own books out and reads up.

 

“But that’s only some of the time. I mean, you study less than me and you are clever, sure, but that can’t be enough—”

 

She huffs, tossing her head to get her braids off her face and looks me in the eye, eyebrows drawn together. “What’s with the interrogation?”

  
My eyes follow the movement involuntarily. I want to touch her hair, see if it is as soft as it looks, as soft as I remember. “I just... I worry about you. I don’t want to hold you back,” I explain, a little taken aback at the sudden change of attitude.

  
“Are you saying you don’t want me to come anymore?” she asks, her gaze unwavering even as her mouth betrays her insecurity. “I know you are doing well enough in everything now. I’m just— I thought I was helping you by correcting your work.”

  
“You are,” I say, firm, because she should never doubt that. “And I want you to come,” I tell her softly, then I plunge ahead. What more do I need than a girl showing up on my doorstep every day for weeks? I said I wasn’t dumb, so I guess I better show it. “But for me,” I say, swallowing but not adding anything more. I fold my right leg between us and push myself back, as if physical distance can help.

  
Her eyes widen in surprise. “I am!” she assures me, her cheeks growing warmer. “I like—” My heart almost stops but she doesn’t finish the sentence. “I have fun with you. I wouldn’t come every day if I didn’t. I was only supposed to come once a week,” she admits.

  
“Aren’t you supposed to tutor other people, too?” I ask, and maybe I’m asking too much. Maybe I should be happy with her friendship, but I want something different than friendship and I’m not good at holding back from what I want. She’s never mentioned her friends. I have no idea if that is what I am to her or what she wants me to be, and I can’t just bring it up. We just met, and at the same time I feel like I know her so well. I have shown her so much, I have seen so much, and if she judged me for this— If it made what came before somehow less—

 

“I was,” she answers. “But, well, they didn’t really need my help anymore. No,” she stops, her tone turning serious, “they didn't want it. Not like you do, not like you want everything. It's worth it with you. I'm not the only one working hard."

  
I have been working hard, but I almost don't feel deserving of that praise. She is the one pushing me forward. Not bugging me about it, just—because she expects the best from me. I straighten, folding the prosthetic back to push myself forward enough to put my hand on her forearm. She goes quiet, and I can hear myself breathing too loudly. “Promise you won’t be angry?”

  
She stares at me, her muscles tense under my hand but not pulling away even though we are so close now that I can see the little markings in her eyes. And then she nods, her eyes not leaving my face, and I lean forward to get even closer… and realise that I’m putting too much weight on her arm. I panic a little, trying to think of how to shift my body, what possible angle I can set the prosthetic to so it will stop me from falling into her.

 

But Seda doesn’t wait for me to ask. Her eyes flicker down, assessing the situation, and then she’s meeting me halfway. She drops her book to the floor when she turns and gets her own knee on the sofa. She doesn’t seem to care, and I definitely don’t when she tilts her head to brush her lips against my cheek. I whimper. I want her mouth on mine. And she’s so close now, I try to move my head to find it, but she takes hold of my face and brings me close enough to breathe her air but not more. If she pulls back, if she takes this back— I will die.

 

With my good leg bent between us there’s no way I can get up to her height, but after an eternal pause it doesn’t matter anymore because she gives me what I need. Her lips settle softly over mine and as I strain my neck to respond, Seda gives me the softest of kisses. She’s afraid, I realise, when I feel her shaking against the hand I have on her waist. Or maybe just nervous, but she’s still here, not saying no and not pulling back —and it means a hell of a lot more if it isn’t easy. I let my tongue peek out, the barest of touches, questioning without any real intent— and she pulls back, panting, eyes wide and startled.

  
I loosen my grip on her hair, smooth it down her neck, then lean back on the sofa, letting my hands slide off her. She looks down at me, not just my eyes but lower, almost as if her eyes have a will of their own and my body calls to them the way hers calls to mine. I swallow, waiting, my right leg folded in front of me, the prosthetic hanging from the side of the sofa.

 

"I— I have never even thought of this," she says, and she doesn’t sound upset— surprised, maybe.

 

I raise an eyebrow at that. She looks confused now, but she didn’t seem surprised when I started leaning in. And sure, she didn’t exactly throw herself at me, but she did kiss me. I don’t say any of that, though. "You didn't notice all those times I could have fried something on your face?"

  
She huffs, exasperated even as her face grows flushed in demonstration. "I meant before you."

  
I push my elbows under me. "I am not fooling around here." I start to shimmy backwards so I can sit up, but she puts her hand on my thigh to stop me. I freeze, because she’s right handed, because it's my left leg that she’s touching. Her hand is centimetres above where my knee ends and the prosthetic begins. Seda looks down with me and I can see the moment she understands that she isn't simply touching me, that this is somehow as intimate as the kiss. To her credit, she doesn't take her hand back, even if it is shaking.

  
"Is this ok?" she asks in a thready voice.

  
I nod. I don't want her to touch lower down. Hell, I don't want to touch the stump myself, but I trust her not to, and I'm wearing the prosthetic anyway. And I really, really want her to touch me higher up, anywhere higher up will do. "Is it ok if there's kissing, too?" I ask. I’m done playing coy. I have taken all the assurances I need. It’s time I gave a little back.

 

Seda smiles her assent, then takes my arm and brings me up to her, surprisingly strong, and once I get my good knee under me it’s easy for her to hold me upright as we kiss. Softly, at first. I haven’t kissed anybody in a long time, and I suspect neither has she. But with my hands framing her face, keeping her hair trapped under my thumbs, it’s so easy to tilt her head and go from soft brushes of lips to licking her teeth a little, and then what’s licking a little deeper? When I go deeper still and our tongues meet, she pulls me flush against her and I shudder at the feeling of my nipples meeting the swell of her chest. She takes the chance unrepentantly and starts kissing me harder and harder, till it’s all I can do to breathe through the onslaught.

 

We stop, eventually, after a hell of a first kiss which Seda then insists is actually our second. She can call it a dental exploration for all I care; I’m so happy I’m dizzy. I lean against her shoulder, curling both knees against her side. Her left arm is still around me, but when she curls towards me her right hand is free. She looks at my left trouser leg for a second, then puts her hand on my upper arm instead.

  
“You can touch it,” I tell her, quietly. “The plastic, I mean. Just not the… not my knee.”

  
“How do I know where it starts?” she murmurs, equally low. So I take her hand and put it where my calf used to be.

  
“Just go down and you’re good,” I say, and she lets her fingers explore —I can feel the cloth pulling along the rest of my leg the same way one feels it when somebody steps on their laces.

  
“I read your stats,” Seda says, voice strained. “There was an article—”

  
“Olympic dreams,” I say. There weren’t that many that she would have found googling.

 

“Yes.”

 

“I’m not giving up,” I explain. “You won’t like it much once I start training for real.”

  
She leaves the prosthetic to hold my face and make me look at her. “I want you to do it. I like how you won’t give up. I want to be the same.”

  
“And you aren’t?” I ask, disbelieving. “You have been here for four years and teachers are asking you to tutor!”

 

“I don’t think tutoring it’s quite on the same level as the Olympics,” she objects, laughing.

  
“It is. I know because you are the kind of person who doesn’t sleep so she can work.” I smile, not because I don’t take her seriously, but because she’s so beautiful and so amazing on top of that, and she’s here with me. How could I not smile?

  
“Ok,” she agrees, amused. “I’m an Olympic level student.”

  
I don’t object to the tone, just kiss her. Win-win.

  


******

  


The day they tell me I can go back to training I almost go out and get drunk. I have never really gotten proper drunk before, but I’m just too happy to bear it sober. I’m lucky I call Seda and she talks me out of doing anything crazy. Well, almost. She asks me over to her house to meet her aunt and have dinner. Food in the UK might be crap, she says, but her aunt still makes a mean lamb stew.

 

Not that I think meeting her family is crazy, we have been together for two months now and she’s met both of my parents, my brother and, of course, aunt Marie, who I’m pretty sure likes her better than she likes me. But her aunt is. Crazy. In a nice eccentric not so old lady way, not in a serial killer way, but still. It does explain why Seda didn’t ask me over before.

 

I thought it might be because of their house but even though it’s a little older than ours and even though I can tell the outside needs painting, it’s pretty cozy once we step through the door. There’s way too many armchairs, all of them with some cushion or blanket strategically placed and the rest of the furniture is all wood of one kind or another. But I barely notice any of it since the moment I step through the door, my mouth is watering at the rich, salty smell of cooking meat. I have to swallow to be able to say hello to the nice lady who comes to receive me into her home, at least I assume she’s nice because she’s smiling at me. She has none of her niece’s shyness but I recognize the way her gaze cuts right through me. She doesn’t respond to my greeting for a long moment, watching me instead, but then she gives a sharp nod like she approves and asks me to please follow her to the table. Seda catches my eye and gives me a little shrug so I follow.   


It goes well, since apparently I’m not a boring sane person as I had previously assumed and can hold my own with the crazy philosophical questions if given a little time —and taking a little time because I’m completely lost just shows I’m deep or something. It ends well, because not only does the stew match its aroma but apparently the crazy also comes with insanely good baking. I end bloated and unable to move from their sofa, watching some show with three witches, storms and crystal balls. I don’t even mind being absolutely quiet because Seda is combing my hair with her fingers. Not that my hair actually needs combing, being the only straight thing about me, but who am I to deny her?

 

“You need to steal that recipe,” I tell her, blinking to keep myself awake.

  
“What for?” She muffles her laughter on my shoulder to avoid interrupting the show. “She loves you. You can ask and she’ll make it anytime.”

  
“I want to eat it every single day of my life, and as good as that pie is, I don’t want to marry your aunt.”

 

“Shla,” she complains, her voice rising in predictable embarrassment. I’m weak, I can’t resist teasing her. Of course, all my half serious declarations of intent might make it hard when I actually do propose. I mean, not that I’m saying I will, but it’s looking good, if you get my drift. Or I might have a sugar high to rival all chocolate highs, you pick.

  
Her aunt pauses the show and gives us a look, then tells Seda, “Just take that girl up so you can whisper sweet nothings and I can watch in peace, will you?”

  
I straighten from my slouch, alarmed, and the old woman actually laughs at me. “What? You think I was born yesterday?”

 

I can feel myself blushing but Seda’s pleased smile confirms it.

 

******

 

I push myself out of the water and that first breath full of chlorine and the rubbery smell of my cap sends me back in time to a million moments of joy. I don’t know if I’m first, or second, or last, but right now all I need to know is that my body aches from a job well done and my lungs rejoice with the reward of oxygen. Nothing can be better than this. And then Seda leans over and catches my arm to pull me out of the pool, right into her arms, not caring that I’m soaking her clothes, and I realise: Yes, there is.

  
  
**The End  
**  

 

 


	2. Cut-scene

CUT SCENES

 

Resignation wasn’t in Cara’s nature, though. The next time we met up was after her mum had talked her into a deep rejuvenating wash that had left her remaining hair its original colour with a slightly blueish tint in direct light. Having a constant reminder of her failure didn’t do anything but encourage her to try again. This time I didn’t suspect a thing, Cara was never secretive with us regarding her rebellious schemes. She assumed we’d see the sense in her actions if she sat us down and explained them because they were sensible and, for the most part, she was right. She shot down any violent plans or demonstrations unless what was destroyed was more symbolic than valuable.

 

So it didn’t occur to me that anything was going on with her except that she was still recovering from the blow of losing her symbol and her hair both. Whatever Cara said about superficiality and the wellbeing industry; she had always taken care of her hair.

 

In retrospective, I should have said no, but when your best friend is as beautiful as Cara… Well, let’s say I had had some thoughts before she interrupted our study session and asked, serious and intent, “Could we try kissing?”

 

I was shocked but Cara didn’t backtrack, just patiently waited for me to finish freaking out. “Why?”

 

“I want to see, that’s all,” she said, and what harm was there in seeing? I was curious myself, so I leaned closer. It was good, good enough that we never pulled back before starting to include hands as well as mouths.

 

When we parted, I stared at her, helplessly smitten already as only a fifteen year old can be, and she grinned at me, pleased and mischievous. And that was the beginning of my first real romance, except I never asked Cara if she had seen anything or if she was seeing me. Nothing really changed, she didn’t tell her parents and I didn’t tell mine, and Hanan and Dotty guessed. It wasn’t serious, not because it wasn’t real, but because Cara and me had never been serious with each other: we loved to joke around and tease and exchanging spit couldn’t change that. Only people assume that not serious means that something isn’t real or important, when it’s quite the opposite sometimes; you cannot allow yourself to be serious about something so essential to you that it’d kill you to lose it.

 

And very quickly, Cara went from being a nice friend with whom I had a great rapport to someone I thought about constantly. Someone I wanted to think of me constantly, and, because she kissed me back, I thought that meant she felt the same way. She started saying she was a lesbian, something I had never done myself. Then she moved on to ‘queer’, which made me uncomfortable to hear despite all her explanations on the theories behind it.

 

It was easy to miss that my feelings had crossed a line hers hasn’t because even though I loved her, or I thought I loved her, it didn’t diminish my love of swimming in the slightest. I wasn’t going to skip on my training to lay out on her bed and make out slow and sweet. It didn’t occur to me that it was odd that Cara did not expect me to; I just appreciated her understanding the same I always had and left it at that.

 

So when she told me she wanted to stop, it was like a bucket of freezing water.

/end cut-scene

**Author's Note:**

> I wrote this story a year ago and only now I’ve realised I never clarified that I have no direct experience of the kind of disability described here. Shla’s experiences were inspired by Natalie du Toit and are completely imagined in consultation with some people who have had personal relationships with amputees, but again, no experiences of their own. I’ve experienced disability (as in “society disabling me”) myself and it irks me beyond reason when other people fuck up my own experiences, but at the same time, there’s such a vacuum and it’s not like most people are inclined to write fiction, so I don’t feel bad about trying my hand at this.
> 
> That said, if I didn’t get it, I’m sorry, and if I messed up something that you’ve lived out of ignorance, I’m sorry too. I wish I could read only accounts by people who have experienced that kind of thing, but there is also a value to trying to imagine what it is like to be different. Maybe we can never live each other’s lives, but the act of pretending we can understand other circumstances and abilities and preferences is in itself a transformative act. I hope, if nothing else, that the story was fun to read, but email me any corrections/clarifications and I’ll try to do better.


End file.
